


Seeing Red

by radondoran



Category: Monsters University (2013)
Genre: Bullying, Community: disney_kink, Gen, Invisibility, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-15
Updated: 2013-12-15
Packaged: 2018-01-05 00:48:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1087612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/radondoran/pseuds/radondoran
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Randy didn't ask for help.  Not from Sullivan, not from anybody.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Seeing Red

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this prompt](http://disney-kink.livejournal.com/9516.html?thread=5804076#t5804076) at disney_kink:
> 
> _Before Randall is accepted into ROR, he is somehow cornered and bullied (physically) by some jock type monsters. Sulley happens to witness it and helps him out. Randall being Randall, is completely furious/humiliated by Sulley's aid, but Sulley just wants to make sure he's okay._
> 
> Contains blood.

It was the night of the big home game against Fear Tech, and the enthusiasm on and around campus made it clear that MU had won. Although really, Randy wasn't sure how exactly the raucous atmosphere would be different if they had lost. If setting a couch on fire was somebody's idea of celebration, what would they do if they were unhappy?

Randy probably ought to be out there participating in the fun, burning couches or partying or something. That was why he'd gone to the game in the first place—football was part of the college experience and he didn't want to miss out on anything. But he hadn't been invited to any parties. Besides, it had taken forever to file out of the stands and it was late, and maybe he'd had enough of the college experience for one night.

So he'd ducked away from the lights and crowds and was making his way back to his dorm via the deserted central campus. And it was just as he passed the dark, looming form of the empty Fine Arts building that—

"Boo!"

The shout was loud and unexpected. Randy disappeared with a start.

It took him a second afterwards to register what was going on. The guy who had jumped out at him was laughing, and so were the three friends who had come out of the shadows to join him. The first guy was the biggest, but they were all reasonably big—not as tall as, say, Jimmy Sullivan, but broad-chested. One wore a hat—probably a ten-years-newer version of the one Mike had—and another carried a backpack over one shoulder. Beyond that it was hard to make out details, especially in the dim light. Randy couldn't even get an immediate impression of their color patterns, the way he usually did, because all had their faces and torsos painted to show school spirit. They must have been watching the game, too. They'd obviously been drinking—Randy knew it was naive to find that scandalous, but he still kind of did.

"I told you, I told you!" one of them was saying. Not the first guy, one of the others. "What did I tell you? Like a light!"

Oh. This again.

Mike said the camouflage was cool, and Mike usually knew what he was talking about, or seemed to anyway. And, yeah, he was right that disappearing could be useful—but most of the time it was just stupid and embarrassing. Randy just wished that he could control it a little better, that he could keep it from acting up whenever he got nervous or stressed out or s... startled. He really was working on it. He'd only disappeared the once tonight, during the first quarter—the fireworks had caught him off guard, and to be completely honest he hadn't been entirely aware that a touchdown had been scored in the first place—but he'd reappeared quickly enough and thought he'd escaped notice. Apparently not.

He reappeared now and tried to look unfazed. "Yeah, very funny," he muttered, then slithered around the guy in his path and kept walking.

The foursome followed, still laughing. "What's the matter?" the first guy taunted. "Did I scare you?"

"No," said Randy coolly.

"I dunno, he looked pretty scared to me," said another.

"Must have jumped three feet."

"And how about that disappearing act? Hey presto! It's like running away without going anywhere." 

That stung, but trying to defend his disappearing habit would only make it seem lamer. Instead, Randy stopped and turned around to counterattack. "I said, I wasn't scared. That wasn't scary, it was cheap. You wouldn't know scary if it bit you."

The big guy scoffed. "I know I'm scarier than a cowardly little bug like you."

"Oh, yeah? Are any of you meatheads even studying scaring?"

None of them had a ready answer to that. The guy with the backpack started to mumble something about business administration, and the guy in the hat elbowed him into silence.

In a moment one of them stepped forward, apparently their leader. "And I suppose you are?" he said.

"That's right."

"Well, what do you know. Looks like we got ourselves a big-shot scaring major. You think getting into the scare program means you're better than us?"

"It means," said Randy, warming to the argument, "that I understand the theories and principles of scaring. I happen to know that scariness is a complex, highly technical skill. You can't make the cut just by being big, dumb and ugly."

The three others stepped forward to form an arc with the leader, and the formation moved slowly closer.

"Say that again, punk." There was danger in his voice, and Randy went invisible again—deliberately.

"Hey, don't go," said the guy with the backpack. He was taking something out of his backpack, shaking it, unscrewing a cap. "Stick around!" With that he slung the container through the air so that the contents sloshed out in a wide arc. The paint, Randy realized as it splashed against his skin. The paint they'd been using on their faces. A second bottle followed in quick succession.

This was bad. Randy made to run for it—and the guys' leader stepped right into his path. "Not so tough now, huh?" he said, leaning down and looking at Randy with a menacing smile. Actually looking at him. He wasn't quite succeeding in making eye contact or anything, but this was enough.

Randy doubled back, started off in another direction, and bumped into the big guy. In rising panic, he tried to push past him. The guy shoved back.

The physical contact seemed to ignite the tension in the air. The big guy chuckled in triumph; another guy made contact; another, and suddenly the game was on. The disembodied paint made a perfect target, and Randy's attempts to dodge and parry only seemed to heighten the thrill of the challenge. One mistimed dodge sent him off balance, and then hard onto the concrete as his back left foot turned and gave out under him. But he recovered in seconds—upright, he could at least make an effort to fend off the blows coming from every direction.

Or almost every direction. The guy in the hat had paused and was hanging back a little, just watching. No, not just watching, Randy realized too late: calculating. He had judged his target's position from the jostling motion of the splashes of color, and now he threw a right hook that connected squarely with Randy's face.

Randy went down. The impact flashed across his brain like a cold glaring brightness, and as consciousness shimmered and faded he could feel himself slipping into visibility again. Not that it made a lot of difference at this point.

Tasting blood, he braced himself for whatever might come next. Then the high-pitched ringing in his ears gave way to another sound, a sudden loud thundering with impossibly deep bass notes that seemed to resonate in his chest. Randy tried to look around for the source of the disturbance. Everything had gone blurrier than usual, but he was aware of blue: not the painted-on MU blue, but a vast swathe of a lighter blue that tended towards green in the darkness.

The blue moved quick and heavy; there was more thunder, and the indistinct sound of voices—anger from the newcomer and wheedling tones from the others. A scuffle; running feet; and at last an awareness of quiet, and of space around him.

And then Sullivan—of course, Sullivan, the color and the size and the roar were unmistakable—Sullivan was bending over him. "Hey, little guy, you OK? Can you hear me?"

Little guy? Just because he didn't weigh half a ton— But before Randy could gather himself enough to speak, Sullivan's huge hands were under him, lifting him bodily from the ground.

That insult was enough to shake off most of the dizziness. "Hey, what gives?"

"Oh, good, you're awake," said Sullivan. "You had me worried there." He tilted Randy to the vertical and held him up, bringing their faces close together. Huh. Sullivan's eyes were blue, too.

"What are you doing?"

"Checking your pupils. High school football, you know." He shifted his passenger into a one-armed carry. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

It was a small mercy that Randy was close enough to tell. "Two. What are you doing _here_?"

"Oh, that! I was on my way to this party, I took a shortcut, I thought I heard something weird, and when I looked around the corner there you were. Guess I was just in the right place at the right time. Pretty lucky, huh? I gotta admit it took me a second to figure out what was going on, though. Sorry I didn't do something before that guy decked you."

So Sullivan had seen that. Of course he had. As if Randy didn't look stupid enough tonight. He'd let himself get tricked and beaten and humiliated, and then James Perfect Sullivan had shown up and chased the guys off like they were nothing. Which, logically, made Randy less than nothing.

And now Sullivan had the nerve to stick around and lord it over him. That smug self-deprecation— _pretty lucky_ , he said, as if it didn't even matter how much bigger and scarier he was than everybody else. As if he didn't even have to mention it, it was so obvious. He didn't have to say he was stronger than Randy; it was enough to be able to pick him up and cradle him so effortlessly.

Randy struggled in the furry arms. "Forget it, just put me down already!"

"You sure you're OK?"

"Yes—put me down! I'm fine. I didn't need you to——!" He cut himself off with a sharp intake of breath as Sullivan set him on his feet.

"What's the matter?" Sullivan asked, supporting him again with one hand. "Twisted ankle?"

Randy pulled away. "I've got others."

"You ought to put ice on that," said Sullivan. "Oh, hey! I have ice!" He picked up his jacket from where he'd left it when he charged in, and with a sheepish smile held up a big clear plastic bag of ice, still stapled shut and wet with condensation. "For the party," he explained in response to Randy's look. "I'm not old enough to buy anything else."

"Keep your ice. I'm going home." Randy turned his back and stalked off, his gait slightly awkward as he tried to keep the weight on his other legs.

"Yeah, good plan," said Sullivan, and fell into step beside him. "You're Mike Wazowski's roommate, aren't you?"

They had three classes together, and Sullivan recognized him only as an afterthought, a mere adjunct of Mike Wazowski. Mike Wazowski, Randy thought, in a sudden access of petty treachery, wasn't even that scary.

"Yeah, so?"

"Cool, your dorm's not too far from here."

"I know where my dorm is. Don't you have somewhere to be?"

Sullivan shrugged. "Not really. It's still pretty early; the guys won't miss me too much. First I want to make sure you get back alright."

"I can take care of myself. You don't have to walk me home."

"Yeah, sure," said Sullivan, but he didn't leave. "So, you wanna tell me what that was all about?"

"No," said Randy curtly.

"OK, fair enough. None of my business, really."

"That's right."

There was a pause. Sullivan started to speak again, and Randy cut him off. "Why did you do that?"

"Do what?" Sullivan glanced behind them. "That? Well—come on, what else would I do? That wasn't a fair fight." It was the same stating-the-obvious tone Randy had heard him use on Mike in their academic disputes. "I didn't really think about it, it just looked like you could use some help."

Who did Sullivan think he was fooling? Nobody was that simple. Randy could find no response but a vague grumble, and he quickened his pace.

Sullivan stayed with him, and when he stumbled over an uneven crack in the pavement, Sullivan reached out with one hand and caught him easily. Sullivan did everything easily.

"Careful, there."

"I've got it." But Randy was aware of how much he was allowing Sullivan to support him, how much he was allowing himself to lean into Sullivan's touch.

"You all right? Want to stop and rest a minute?"

As a matter of fact, he did want to rest, desperately. But it wasn't worth giving in to Sullivan, or prolonging this humiliation even one minute. "I'm fine." He shrugged off the hand and kept going.

Sullivan kept close. Casually he said, "You know, it'd be no big deal for me to carry you."

Yeah. Yeah, Randy did know that, thanks. That was the problem—couldn't this idiot see that? Randy almost wanted to shout at him, but what could he say? _Stop being better than me_? It was an impossibly stupid sentiment—and besides, maybe he'd had enough of talking back to guys bigger than he was. So he swallowed the anger and made his voice cold. "No thanks."

"Suit yourself," said Sullivan, and they walked on in silence.

At last they turned the corner of the dining hall and came out in front of the dorm's brightly-lit front steps. The light shining through Sullivan's fur gave him a luminous blue corona; it was almost a beatific effect. Typical.

"Well," said Sullivan, "here we are."

"Yeah. Bye." And Randy started up the steps.

Sullivan lingered a moment. "You OK from here?"

"Yeah," Randy repeated. "Bye."

"All right. Take it easy, buddy."

"The name," Randy shouted after him, "is Randall Boggs!" He wasn't about to let James P. Sullivan call him by the diminutive.

Sullivan didn't call him anything. He waved, hefted his bag of ice, and was off without a care.

* * *

Randy got past the front desk and upstairs without attracting comment—not by being invisible but simply by being unnoticed. That was nothing new; nobody ever really paid any attention to him. Or if they did, it was like tonight. So much for a fresh start.

The only thing he wanted to do after a night like this was to hide away, shut himself up in his own space and try to recover some kind of normality. But this was college, and there was no such thing as your own space.

"Hey," said Mike, looking up at the sound of the door opening—and then he did a double take. "Oh my god, what happened to you?" He rushed over, dropping his highlighter and abandoning the textbook. "Are you OK? Don't worry, I've got a first-aid kit—oh man, that looks really bad—you better sit down, can I get you some water or—"

Why couldn't Mike have gone out on a Friday night, just this once? "No—would you—just—" Randy faltered, and all at once he was looming over Mike with a snarl—" _back off!_ "

Mike retreated with an audible gasp. Randy had done that a couple of times before: scared Mike. Even now, as every scrape stung anew at the lunge upright, some abstract part of him appreciated that. This lingering, seething rage held a volatile kind of power.

"Sorry," said Mike, keeping his distance. "I just—wanted to make sure you're OK."

First Sullivan and now this. "I'm fine, all right? I just want to take a shower and go to bed."

"Yeah, uh—yeah, of, of course. Sorry. What happened? I mean, you look like you got in a fight or something."

"Or something. Yeah. Look, it was just—I ran into these guys on the way back and they... and things kind of got out of hand."

"Wait, why didn't you just di... Oh. Oh, dude." And Mike's eye darted downward as he registered the splashes of paint for the first time, realized what they meant. "Blue and white," he said, half to himself. "Our school colors." He met Randy's eyes again and made a slight movement towards him, as if wanting to put a comforting hand on his shoulder. So Mike got it. He understood, he _saw_ the ignominy and the violation. And that made Randy feel as exposed as anything had tonight.

"Quit looking at me like that!" Randy broke eye contact and turned around to get his stuff out of his wardrobe. "I don't want your pity. I can take care of myself! If it hadn't been for that jerk Sullivan I..."

"Wait, Sullivan?" And now Mike was tense with rising fury. "Sullivan did this to you? Oh, that is low. I'm gonna find that guy and give him a piece of my mind—"

"It wasn't like that!" Randy snapped. Raising his voice was making his head hurt worse, which didn't exactly improve his mood. "I said it was just some guys. Nobody we know. Sullivan's the one who barged in with his big stupid roar and... and stopped it."

Mike stared. "Sullivan stopped them?"

"Yeah, he came out of nowhere and chased the other guys off, and then he was all, 'hey little guy, let me help you', and he followed me back here and he wouldn't quit bugging me and—I mean, can you believe that guy?"

"No," said Mike.

"That's what I'm saying! It just makes me so mad! What a smug jerk. He thinks he's so great. Everybody's golden boy, throwing his bulk around to make himself look like a hero..."

"I hate to say it," Mike ventured, "but maybe he just wanted to help."

"I didn't ask for his help. It was none of his business."

"I guess. I just think it's a little weird. You're telling me that a bunch of lowlifes picked on you and messed you up, and you're mad at Sullivan for saving you?"

Randy dropped the shower caddy with a clatter and darted across the floor so that he came up close and tall in front of Mike again. "He didn't _save_ me. I don't need saving! Why does everybody think I'm a wimp? I told you, I told Sullivan, I can look out for myself. I'd get along perfectly fine if everybody would just shut up and stay out of my way!" There was a pause as he stood there glaring down at Mike, waiting for him to argue.

Mike said, "You're bleeding."

Mirroring Mike's vague gesture, Randy brought a hand to his lip. The fingers came away smeared with crimson, and he stared frozenly.

It was not the fact of its being blood that bothered him. What compelled his gaze to a tight focus a few inches in front of his face was the color, the sudden intense, stifling-hot red in the midst of the bland off-whites of dorm interior design. Randy tensed with a wild impulse to match the color. He repressed it, swallowed hard. Then for a moment the incandescent light brought out an orange tone, and when he blinked away the brightness the afterimage showed Sullivan blue. That was too much, and he bolted from the room.

Alone in the hall bathroom he left the cold water running and pressed a wet paper towel to his busted lip and swore under his breath. He was leaning on the sink; the energy of adrenaline had worn off, leaving only pain and deep fatigue.

He glanced up at the mirror. At least the vivid red was darkened and neutralized in the brown of the cheap paper. His own purple and pink, too, looked dull in this light, fading towards a deeper violet where bruises were forming—and then there were the bright, damning splashes of varsity white and MU blue. It was a pathetic picture. No wonder Sullivan thought of him as a nobody. Something had to change. He was a college student! He was supposed to finally be getting in with the cool crowd. He was supposed to be studying to become a great scarer. He couldn't keep being this weak, nervous, awkward— _kid_ , to be teased and ignored and worst of all rescued.

He glared at the loser kid in the mirror. Then in the background, indistinct, he caught sight of lime green. Mike had come after him and was hanging back, awkward and hesitant.

"Randy? Hey, you OK?" When he got no answer, he kept talking. "Was it the blood, do you feel sick? Relax. Try taking deep breaths."

Randy did take a deep breath—and then he rounded on Mike and put the breath, the frustration, the resentment, into a ferocious hissing growl. Again he dimly noted that even through a mouthful of wet paper it was a better growl than he'd ever yet managed in scare class.

This time, though, Mike didn't flinch. "OK," he said mildly, and turned to leave. "I'll stay out of your way."

They turned off the lights that night without having exchanged another word. Randy slept badly, and dreamed in shades of blue.


End file.
